Condoleezza Rice signs her book "Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family,'' during a 2010 appearance in Birmingham.
(Birmingham News Photo Linda Stelter)

Former U.S. Secretary of State and Birmingham native Condoleezza Rice says the controversy over Alabama’s immigration law is a direct result of the federal government’s failure to deal with a difficult issue.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Press-Register on Friday, Rice offered her views on Alabama politics, the 2012 elections and her time in Washington as a top advisor to President George W. Bush.

Rice, 56, served as Bush’s national security advisor from 2001-2005, and as the nation’s first black female secretary of state from 2006-2009. She said she is enjoying civilian life as a political science professor at Stanford University and has no desire to return to politics.

“I’m not going to run for something in any state, including the ones in which I lived,” she said by phone from Arkansas, where she spoke to Wal-Mart executives and conducted the opening coin toss at a high school football game. “I love Stanford and I plan to be there for the foreseeable future.”

Rice was back in Alabama on Saturday to attend the football game between the University of Alabama and LSU, and she’ll return to her home state on Thursday as the featured speaker at the University of Mobile’s annual Leadership Banquet. Also Thursday, she’ll appear at Page & Palette book store in Fairhope to sign copies of her new memoir, “No Higher Honor.”

“I love being in Alabama. It’s basically where my whole family is now, and it truly is my second home,” she said. “But I haven’t been down to lower Alabama in a long time, and I really look forward to seeing the gulf.”

Here are some excerpts from Rice’s comments on a variety of political topics:

Immigration: Rice said the failure to pass comprehensive reforms of the nation’s immigration laws was the single biggest disappointment of her time in Washington.

“We tried for it in 2007 and couldn’t get it done. And I think what we’re seeing in Alabama and the other states is a response to that,” she said. “I certainly understand why they are frustrated. But I don’t think a patchwork of state laws is going to serve us very well. It’s something the federal government is going to have to solve.”

Rice said the issue is complex because it has broad social, economic and national security consequences.

“We have to remember that the United States is a place where people want to come and make a better life, and that enriches us as a nation,” she said. “Immigration actually keeps us from some of the demographic problems that Europe and Japan now have and that China is soon going to have. So the challenge is to establish a common policy that upholds the laws, protects our borders and yet still encourages that enrichment that immigrants bring to us.”

But Rice said she’s not optimistic that Congress will act anytime soon.

“It’s probably not going to happen in 2012 because it’s an election year. But maybe in 2013 we can get back to a serious conversation about it,” she said.

Alabama’s reputation: Rice conceded that the controversy over Alabama’s immigration law has not helped the state’s image in the eyes of the world. But she said it’s unfair to relate the current controversy to Alabama’s civil rights past.

“Alabama has a difficult history. We all know that,” said Rice, who was raised in segregated Birmingham. “But anyone who’s visited Alabama in recent years knows that it is a very different state than it was when I was a child growing up there in the 1950s and 60s. So I don’t think Alabama should be unfairly tarnished because of its history in that regard. We don’t need to revisit the old stereotypes.”

She said she was not familiar with the details of Alabama’s immigration law but that the state would do well to embrace immigrants.

“I think we need to be really careful about what kind of laws we pass and that, in the effort to get a handle on this problem, we don’t end up making the problem worse,” she said. “The fact is that, generally speaking, this patchwork approach is not serving us well and we need to find a better solution. State laws are just not going to do it.”

Condoleezza Rice will sign copies of her new memoir, "No Higher Honor," during an appearance in Fairhope on Thursday, and will serve as the featured speaker that night at the University of Mobile's annual Leadership Banquet.

The 2012 election: Rice, a Republican, said she’s continuing to evaluate the field of GOP presidential candidates and is not ready to make an endorsement. She said she’s looking for a candidate “who shares my values, specifically my belief that America is exceptional, that it is a place with a special ideal that holds us together. Somebody who recognizes the greatness of America and where that comes from.”

Rice also said she wants a candidate “who will tell the truth about our circumstances. We are going to have to reform entitlements. We are going to have to get our fiscal house in order. That is very important to me.”

Finally, she said, she is looking for a candidate “who has a combination of experiences that will give them a running start when they get in the White House. And I think that can come from a variety of backgrounds. We’ve tended to nominate governors or senators, but I think that can from business people, too.”

Rice ruled out any possibility that she could end up voting for President Barack Obama.

“No, that will not happen. I am a committed Republican,” she said.

On the GOP field: “I think we have some good candidates. I know it’s been a little rough and tumble at times, and that is upsetting to some people. But I’ve always thought that it’s not a bad thing to have competitive primaries, where you see the candidates under pressure and where you see them a little tired. Because let me tell you something — when you get to the Oval Office, that pressure is going to multiply a hundred times. So I think it’s a good thing for voters to see how candidates deal with adversity.”

On foreign policy and the Middle East: “I believe you should leave your successors plenty of room, so I’ve hesitated to be at all publicly critical of the administration. Because I’ll tell you — it’s a lot harder in the Oval than it is out here. That said, we do have some foreign policy problems. I do think, on the Middle East, the Obama administration missed some opportunities.

“When we left office, the Israelis and Palestinians were actually pretty close to a deal. The new administration came in and focused on a settlement freeze — and no Israeli prime minister can afford to do that, I don’t care what part of the political spectrum he comes from. So I think Israel felt isolated, and Israel is only willing to take tough positions when it feels it has the backing of the Americans. And I think that was a lesson that may have been forgotten.

“You know, we’re going to have candidates out there talking about foreign policy, and frankly I wish they’d talk about it even more, because the American people need to know where they stand on some of these issues. But we have to remember that, once you’re the president, you are responding not just to what you said in the campaign, but to the conditions that you find.”

On her appearance in Mobile on Thursday: “I’m going to talk about some of the challenges we have as a nation, but of course I’m an optimist. I know we’re going through a tough time, but I have seen a lot of circumstances in which the United States has come through and made what seemed impossible one day, seem inevitable the next. So that’s my message, and maybe I’ll throw in a story about Col. Gaddafi.”